A New Coversation about Race

In the Oct. 29 issue of Newsweek, Ellis Cose writes Democrats need to change the way they talk about race. Cose writes that race and class are “the most loaded issues in politics” and that most politicians, especially on the Republican side, have an indirect, coded way to talk about it.

Cose says Democrats are uneasy with their political base, which is made up of labor union supporters, social liberals and African-Americans, qmong others. To unify this base, Cose says, Democrats need to rely on a new strategy: “Democrats should rely on positive, explicit racial appeals by evoking ideals like fairness, equality and common destiny.”